Hi Janie
I'm happy that you're still where you should be though I guess you're reading the hand writing on the wall. It seems that the current fashion of handing over what should be government programs to "for profits" is a basic washing of hands as far as responsibilties on the part of the program's entrusted. That way if the "for profit" can make a go of it all well & good & if it takes the "for profit" stripping away the guts of the program or cutting the benifits or the number of benficiaries out to accomplish this , well the government bares no resonpsibilities here either, take it up with the "for profit", after all it is their program now. A bit like outsourcing only on a local level.
Persently this is happening with schools & prisions alike, hospitals are inventing their own versions of this & the health care system & the related health insurance industry are finding their own varients of this, just look at social security reforms. What it boils down to & the bottom line is a cheap stream lined machine that caters to the bare neccesities of those that were originally supposed to be benifiting from these programs. Now it is to benifit these "for profits" & the folks that were supposed to beifit are now only the excues so that a profit can be made from them. It has become a business rather than a social program which our taxes have paiid for & now support. So we in essence are subsidizing & paying these "for profit" businesses that were established to aid the poor but are now enabling themselves to what the poor should be recieving. If that don't beat all & they call it reform. An' here I thoght the poor were supposed to benifit, silly me.

It pays businesses to have the poor around so that a profit can be made off them. Not only do these business get supported by our tax dollar it would seem but it would also seem that they would reap & rape the tax system too at the same time. Count the benefits of what they're charging the government for their services & add any double dipping for health costs & this is not a cheaper way to run things. But again it's not about the poor any longer it about the profit.

For "help agencies" are getting stripped & gutted, this has always been the case but now there is a diferent slant on them. Before it was "the good fight" to help those less fortunate & God knows that those doing the fighting for those doing the dying weren't getting paid much for it either. Now it's a "for profit business" & the botton line is the profit, plain & simple. No longer can people like Janie & others hold up a proud smile & head & say "what I do helps others in need". They've being stripped of their pride. A sorry way to see how the folks in Social Services are turned around IMHO.
A sorry way to treat the needy too.

Barry